


Her

by thesmolestnerd



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Abandonment Issues, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Coffee Shops, Emotional Hurt, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Growing Apart, Growing Up, Healing, Hurt/Comfort, I love recovering beans, I might do more adora/bow/glimmer that's explicted relationship and sexual, Polyamory, all the ships are implied tbh, friendships, if anyone wants it, it's all impled, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-08
Updated: 2019-02-08
Packaged: 2019-10-24 06:05:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17699039
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesmolestnerd/pseuds/thesmolestnerd
Summary: Your head jerks up. It’s barely eight in the morning, but there she was, in line. You would recognize Her anywhere.********************************************************************************************************Modern Au Adora realizes that there's more than one kind of love.





	Her

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally a completely different story, but I though it would work for Adora. 
> 
> Lemme know what you think!
> 
> Thanks!

You’re at work. Coffee still smells good to some people but the sickly-sweet smell of the processed sugars cloud you’re brain. By the end of the shift, you know you’ll smell of dried whip cream and despair. 

Your coworkers talk about things that you wish you didn’t understand. After all, you have to play the part of a college student saving up for a better future. Not a beaten girl who— 

Grab cup, read cup, pump syrup, queue shots, aerate milk, steam milk, stand and stare blankly, pour milk into cup, finish and connect. And repeat. And repeat. And—

Your head jerks up. It’s barely eight in the morning, but there she was, in line. You would recognize Her anywhere.

It’s been years. It’s been 2 years since you went to Her soccer game even though you shouldn’t have. It’s been 3 since the last time you talked to Her. It was your sophomore year of high school the last time you made Her laugh. Four years since you watched her mood swings get worse. And it is your fault. You were taken away to live with the Nice Rich Family. She still had to deal with the crime and drugs and abuse and— 

You swallow and go back to making drinks. A cold feeling washes over you. You’re sure She’s staring at you with Her mismatched eyes—She’s always hated he color of Her eyes. You loved them. You loved staring at Her eyes. On a boat. Her face only inches away from yours on the boat. The Moons had been there and that was the only reason you hadn’t just gone for it, social norms be damned. 

You flinch as hot coffee lands on your hand. 

“Shit!” Your assistant manager shoots you a look.

“No swearing behind the bar.” You run your hand under the water and turn back around. 

She’s looking at you. Intensely. It’s an intensity you haven’t felt in years, and it makes you shiver. Love, loss, longing…it’s all too much for this early in the morning. You want to look away. You want to run away. But you don’t. You level your gaze, your heart in your throat. 

You can’t tell what She’s thinking, for once. She knows you go to school here. Your old high school had bragged about how well you did to be able to go here. Despite that, there’s still shock on Her face. You can’t tell what the other thoughts are. You aren’t sure if you like that or not. Maybe this is good. Maybe it means you’ve moved on. 

At the same, you hope it’s love. You wonder and hope she still feels that for you. But in your heart of hearts, you know it’s hate. You know what you did. She knows what She’s done. She just never apologized and never gave you a chance to fix it. 

You tear your gaze away and wipe up the mess. 

She stepped up to the register. Her voice sent you back to high school. When you loved Her, and She didn’t love you. When She turned your friends against without even getting them on her side. When you realized you were alone, and in love with a girl who just wasn’t ready to love anyone. And when your love for Her destroyed you and revealed the wounds of your childhood you had spent your teenage years trying to ignore. 

“Grande white mocha,” She says. 

“Hot or cold,” asks your coworker. 

“Hot,” She says. You feel her eyes scanning over you and feel a weird feeling bubbling up in her chest. Your jaw clenches. What is she thinking? It’s so weird. It’s been years. Years of trying not to ask what She was doing. Years of trying not to think about what She’d done to you and how She warped your idea of how love is supposed to work.

You could have handed the cup off to someone else and ducked into the back room like you had done many times before for far less terrifying people. But you didn’t. Grab cup, read cup, pump syrup, queue shots, aerate milk, steam milk, stand and stare blankly, pour milk into cup, finish and connect. It was simple. You could do it. It was just another drink. Unsent letters, unspoken words—it was just another drink. 

You thought back to your senior year of high school, when She would come in dressed up, full face of make-up, Converse, her skirt, a flowy shirt tucked in. She would dress so beautiful it would make your heart hurt. She’d be carrying a cup of Starbucks, sitting at the table across from you. You knew watching her was wrong. You knew that she should be left alone even if she wronged you and you wronged her and…

Her drink was done. You look down at the drink in your hand and then out to the morning crowd on the other side of the bar. You shouldn’t hand her your drink. 

You walk forward. The world is quiet. It’s just you and Her, eyes locked. Your arm reaches out. Your mouth forms to say Her name. It’s been years and finally—

I wake up...

kicking my friend in the head. He groans.

“Go back to sleep, Adora,” Bow mumbles. On the other side of the air mattress, Glimmer lets out a soft sigh and nuzzles her nose into my back.

“Don’t have work…go to bed…” she says. 

There’s an ache in my chest. The dreams doesn’t hurt as much as they used to. Thinking about Her is strange. She alienated you from your friends. She hurt you. But at the end of the day, I realize, maybe that’s okay. 

Bow rolled over.

“Shh…I can hear you thinking…knock that shit off,” he muttered. I snorted. 

“Fine. I’ll stop thinking.”

“My job to think. Your job to shush,” said Gimmer. 

And maybe that hurt has led me here we worth it. Maybe the ache would never go away, but it certainly wouldn’t kill me. 

“Were you dreaming about Her?” asked Glimmer. 

“Yeah.” Glimmer rubbed her nose up and down your back. 

“Do you wanna talk about it?” mumbled Glimmer. I shook my head. 

“No.” She would never come back with a grand entrance and beg for my forgiveness. And neither would all my “friends” who let her treat me like that back in high school. 

“You sure?” asked Bow. He sat part way up. I shook my head. 

The dream—that doesn’t matter. I learned what reciprocated friendship looked like. They would do for me what I did for them, that She never would have thought of. I realized that a romantic partner wouldn’t fill the hole in your chest if they didn’t care. But friends could fill it if they cared enough. 

You didn’t need Her to be your girlfriend so you could love yourself. You just needed to know that you could be loved.


End file.
